The present disclosure relates generally to power switching controllers and, more specifically, to a control architecture for a power switching controller.
In power distribution systems there are multiple power outputs that are powered from a single power source and protected from short circuit fault propagation using power controller circuits, such as solid-state power controllers (SSPC's). In such an arrangement, each of the multiple power outputs are individually switched, and the power switching controller circuit for a given power output is referred to as a power channel.
In conventional power distribution systems, each power channel includes a dedicated isolated power supply, microcontroller, and isolated data bus. When multiphase AC switching is implemented in conventional control architectures, a semiconductor output switch for each channel is referenced to the switched voltage of the channel. Consequently, each power control channel is referenced to the switched voltage of the power control channel. As each individual channel of a multiphase switch is referenced to different input phases, at any given point in time the power channels do not have the same ground potential. Due to the varying reference voltages, cross-communicating between the channels requires isolation of the channels. Inter channel cross-communication is required to synchronize tripping in the case that one channel detects a short circuit fault, and can be used to implement additional synchronization features.